🇷🇺 🇺🇸 #Article by Anatoly #Antonov about the causes and goals of the special military operation of Russia in Ukraine
– The special operation in Ukraine is the result of the unwillingness of the Kiev regime to stop the genocide of Russians by fulfilling its obligations under the international commitments. The desire of the NATO member states to use the territory of a neighboring state to establish a foothold in the struggle against Russia is also obvious. –
Eight years ago, we witnessed tragic events in the center of the Ukrainian capital. As a result of the bloody coup d'état instigated by the West, forces drawing on ultranationalist ideas came to power in Kiev. From the first days of their rule, the putschists unleashed a wide-ranging campaign against the Russian language and culture, which are native for tens of millions of people in Ukraine. And so the aggressive imposition of a new ideology was started – they proclaimed as national heroes of the country that defeated fascism Nazi accomplices Stepan Bandera, Roman Shukhevych and others (the facts of their crimes were documented and condemned at the Nuremberg trials).
De facto, such a policy has taken root in Ukraine under external administration. It got to the point that foreign citizens were appointed to key posts in Kiev. This situation led to the strengthening of the already pronounced anti-Russian line.
One of the first decisions of the new government was to revoke the status of Russian as a state language. The persecution of the opposition media and large-scale harassment of dissidents began. Extrajudicial reprisals against political opponents have become a norm of life. On May 2, 2014, a tragedy, unprecedented in its cruelty, happened in Odessa. Russian-speaking supporters of the federalization of Ukraine, who had taken refuge from Nazi youths in an administrative building, were burnt alive. Forty-eight people died in a fire. The perpetrators have not been found and punished thus far.
Aggressive Russophobia reached its peak when an attempt was made to forcefully suppress the uprising of people’s militia in Donbass against the Kiev junta’s crimes. The military campaign, which the Ukrainian authorities orchestrated to target their own citizens, has been carried out since April 2014 and has already claimed lives of more than fourteen thousand people. Many of them died as a result of the systematic bombardments by the Armed Forces of Ukraine of residential areas and civilian infrastructure facilities. Numerous facts of killings of peaceful civilians have been verified not only by journalists, but also by the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission. There are at least 152 children among the victims.
Courage of citizens of the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics in defending their lands forced Kiev to sign the Minsk agreements in February 2015 that provided a formula for the political settlement of the intra-Ukrainian conflict. Through the mediation of Russia, France, Germany and the OSCE, practical steps were worked out to reintegrate the Donbas regions into Ukraine as autonomies.
The Presidents of Russia and the United States discussed in detail the situation in Ukraine in Geneva in June 2021. They underscored a mutual willingness to facilitate the effective and immediate implementation of the Minsk agreements by the parties to the conflict. An important point here is that the U.S. delegation confirmed the possibility of granting a special status to the DPR and the LPR based on these documents. Nevertheless, not a single step was made to bring the Geneva understandings to life.
The nationalist frenzy and revanchist sentiments of the Kiev regime resulted in the full sabotage of the Minsk agreements. For the past seven years since they were signed, no paragraph thereof was realized. Instead, the Ukrainian authorities have chosen the path of rapid militarization. The NATO member countries have commenced a military exploration of Ukraine. It was flooded with Western weaponry while President Vladimir Zelensky announced Kiev’s plans to acquire nuclear weapons